By Joan Cartan-Hansen
Need money for that professional training? Have a great idea for a story and no funds to get it to print or on the air? The Idaho Press Club can help.
The Don Watkins Mid-Career Scholarship awards $500 for any Idaho Press Club member to use for any training or project that will improve the working press in Idaho. This could include going to a conference you have wanted to attend or funding toward travel on that enterprise story you have been working on for months. The only catch: You must share what you … [Read more...]

New faces in your newsroom or communication department? Let everyone know. Send your Media Moves to: email@idahopressclub.org
IDAHO EDUCATION NEWS
Idaho Education News' multimedia specialist Andrew Reed has accepted a position with EdSource in Oakland, Calif. He will work with EdNews through the first part of January and begin his new position in … [Read more...]

By Katie Terhune
It's easy to feel like we are all doing more with less these days – but don't despair! The Southwest Chapter of the Idaho Press Club is here to help.
This year's Fall Conference will showcase some awesome local and national journalists to talk about some of their best recent reporting and share their tips for how to take your own work to the next level.
Les Zaitz, of the Malheur Enterprise and newly-launched Salem Reporter, and Charlie Ornstein, senior editor at ProPublica, will headline the conference. They … [Read more...]

President’s column
By Betsy Russell
It’s really quite heartening that with a significant case pending involving press freedom in Idaho, the Verity case that’s before the Idaho Supreme Court, not only Idaho news media organizations but major news media organizations across the country all signed on to an amicus, or “friend of the court,” brief, arguing against recognizing libel by implication in Idaho. We have all long known that truth is a defense against libel, and we certainly hope our laws in Idaho continue to recognize … [Read more...]

Editor’s note: This article first appeared in the Idaho Press; it is reprinted here by permission.By Tommy Simmons
At the heart of the case attorneys argued Friday, Sept. 21 before the Idaho Supreme Court is the question of when and why news organizations can face lawsuits for factual reporting, as well as who can file that lawsuit.
The suit involves former Idaho teacher James Verity, who sued news outlets last year for reporting on a sexual relationship he had with a student and the subsequent fallout, … [Read more...]

Watchdog workshop
By Holly BeechEditor’s Note: Holly Beech won an Idaho Press Club Don Watkins Mid-Career Scholarship to attend an IRE watchdog workshop in Portland in April. This is her article on what she learned there. You, too, can apply for an Idaho Press Club scholarship; the deadline is Feb. 15. See our website, www.idahopressclub.org, for details.
Jason Leopold is involved in dozens of lawsuits against the government challenging public record … [Read more...]

ASSOCIATED PRESS
Statehouse reporter Kimberlee Kruesi left the AP Boise bureau to be the statehouse reporter for AP in Nashville. Longtime AP reporter Keith Ridler in Boise will cover Idaho politics in addition to his natural resources beat.
IDAHO BUSINESS REVIEW
Kim Burgess is the new editor of the Idaho Business Review, replacing Anne Wallace Allen, who returned to the East Coast to work as an investigative business reporter. Burgess formerly was an education reporter at the Albuquerque Journal and briefly worked for a trade … [Read more...]

By Melissa Davlin
The Idaho media has plenty to celebrate as new laws go into effect on July 1 -- both for what the 2018 Legislature passed, and what it didn’t.
Each session, the Idaho Press Club’s First Amendment Committee, which advocates for public records access and open meetings, works with lobbyists and lawmakers on bills that promoted government transparency, and against proposals that go against that spirit of openness.
Here are some highlights from the 2018 session:

By Betsy Z. Russell
After nearly 27 years with The Spokesman-Review – a fine newspaper – I never thought I’d switch at this point in my career. But then the Idaho Press came along. In May, I started as the new Boise bureau chief for the Idaho Press and Adams Publishing Group, a family-owned company that in addition to the longstanding Canyon County daily (formerly the Idaho Press-Tribune), also owns the Post Register in Idaho Falls, the Idaho State Journal in Pocatello, and several other smaller papers throughout southern … [Read more...]

Note: Ben Olson, publisher of the Sandpoint Reader, won an Idaho Press Club Don Watkins Mid-Career Scholarship of $500 to aid in this project. You, too, can apply for the mid-career scholarship, which is available for any Idaho Press Club member to use for any training or project that will benefit the working press in Idaho. The deadline to apply each year is Feb. 15; there's more information at our website, www.idahopressclub.org.By Ben Olson
Every January, the alternative weekly Sandpoint … [Read more...]

Rhonda Prast is the executive editor of the Idaho Statesman and a board member of the Idaho Press Club. Born in Indiana, she grew up in Phoenix. She did not consider a career in journalism until midway through college, switching from an advertising design major to photojournalism. She has worked for seven news organizations across the country in her career. She developed iPad apps as a Magazine faculty professor at the Missouri School of Journalism and led a team to create a sports app at the Kansas City Star. She answered 10 … [Read more...]

BOISE STATE PUBLIC RADIO
Gemma Gaudette, on-air host of Idaho Matters on Boise State Public Radio, comes on board from the University of Idaho. Richard Copeland, senior producer of Idaho Matters on Boise State Public Radio, joins the staff from WITF, a public media organization in central Pennsylvania.
Summer interns are Will Reid of Yale University and Blake Simony of Boise State.
EAST IDAHO NEWS
Rett Nelson has been promoted to an editor/reporter. The publication also recently learned that EastIdahoNews.com has won a National … [Read more...]

President’s ColumnBy Betsy Z. Russell
The Idaho Press Club recently partnered with Attorneys for Civic Education, the University of Idaho College of Law, the Idaho Supreme Court, and the U.S. District Court to put on a journalists’ institute on covering the courts – and it was both well-attended and highly successful.
The one-day conference held at the Idaho Law & Justice Learning Center drew more than two dozen attendees from across the state, including TV and print reporters and editors from Moscow, Lewiston, … [Read more...]

Don Watkins Mid-Career Scholarship report
NOTE: The Don Watkins Mid-Career Scholarship allows an Idaho journalist to receive $500 toward professional development or a reporting project – on the condition that they share the results with the Idaho Press Club membership. Here’s a report from one of our winners, Alison Smith of the Times-News. Our next issue will include a report from winner Ben Olson of the Sandpoint Reader.
By Alison Smith
In October, I was lucky enough to be accepted to the Poynter Leadership Academy in … [Read more...]